Lupin's Secret
by Crave Kashmir
Summary: When Snape assigns an essay on identifying werewolves, Hermione notices that the points apply to their new DADA teacher. She sets out to learn the truth, but what else will she discover in the process? Surely, the man couldn't be hiding anything else.
1. Chapter 1: A Curious Assignmnet

A/N: Just to warn you, the first couple chapters are primarily Hermione thinking and arguing with herself… not much dialogue to be had, but I added it where I could.

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Lupin's Secret  
Chapter 1: A Curious Assignment

Groaning under the weight of their assignment the third year Gryffindors hurried from the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom before Snape could tack anything onto the homework. While Harry and Ron grumbled and complained, Hermione was quietly considering the curious absence of their regular teacher, Remus J. Lupin, and Snape's odd choice of subject matter. Werewolves were far beyond their current level after the disastrous tenure of Gilderoy Lockhart; Lupin had been steadily correcting his predecessor's failures and they were moving along at a fair pace. But to suddenly jump to something as important as werewolves was not something Lupin would have done.

Odd that it would happen during the full moon.

Odd that Lupin was ill at the full moon.

"Impossible…" Hermione muttered to herself and thought back through the lecture on werewolves. Even though they shouldn't have been learning about the interesting, if dangerous, creatures so early in the term, she had already read the chapter on them. Between the lecture and what she had read, she already knew what she was going to write for her essay on recognizing werewolves. As she walked, she started applying the list of indicators to her professor.

Remus J. Lupin was covered in scars as many werewolves were from when they were attacked by the wolf that infected them or from the damage they did to themselves when under the influence of the moon. That wasn't necessarily an indicator, however, as Lupin was clearly well-versed in the defensive arts and had probably squared off with many dangerous creatures. The scars might well have been from a dragon. No one had ever asked and he had never brought them up.

She was struck by the fact that no one, not even outspoken Lavender Brown, had mentioned his scars. Surely facial scars would be something worth asking about… yet no one had.

'Curious,' she thought before moving on.

He had grown thin as the moon waxed to full. She hadn't thought anything of it at the time, but now she recognized it as an indicator of lycanthropy. Few studies had been done, but research did indicate that a lycanthrope began to feel the pull of the moon as early as the waxing crescent. The older the person, the more control he or she had, but it was clear that a werewolf was affected well before the waxing gibbous rose in the night sky.

"Perhaps it increases metabolism," she considered aloud. "There has to be a reason for weight loss."

"What was that?" Ron asked through a mouthful of sandwich.

"Nothing," she replied and didn't even bother chiding him about speaking with his mouth full. "Actually, Harry… did you get a look at that potion Snape made for Lupin?"

"Yeah," he said and worry pulled at his face. "You think it made him sick?"

She shook her head. "What did it look like?"

"Nasty," he wrinkled his nose up remembering the smell. "It stunk and had blue smoke coming off it. I wouldn't have drunk it even if Dumbledore had made it. Lupin's mental for trusting anything Snape makes."

She nodded and added that to her list of curiosities – a potion with a foul taste and smell and blue smoke. There were no brews like that at their level; she would have to check the library. She finished lunch in a hurry and ran to the library while Harry and Ron shared a look that indicated their thoughts that she was as mental as Lupin.

Hermione found the books on werewolves in the open sections of the library, but all of them were over one hundred years old and had nothing about a potion to stave off the effects of lycanthropy. None of the advanced potions books had any reference to it, either. Her eyes fell to the heavy bars guarding the Restricted Section of the library. Surely, if there was a potion to aid a werewolf it would be in there. Frowning, Hermione considered her options for gaining access to the books. Despite her excellent academic record, most teachers would not readily grant her permission to peruse the complicated and dangerous books.

A thought struck her and she sat up a little straighter.

"Snape," she said with a smile. The man clearly had it in mind to reveal Lupin's secret… if that really was his secret. She snatched up her notebook and bag and ran from the library.

Her fist knocked persistently on the door as her teeth worked her bottom lip. 'The worst he can do is take a few points and tell you to go away,' she told herself, though any dealings with the taciturn professor made her nervous beyond reason.

"What?" he demanded in a clipped tone.

"Professor, I'm sorry to disturb you, but I was hoping you might give me a pass to access the Restricted Section of the library," she said in a rush.

His eyes narrowed until they were practically closed. She thought maybe he hadn't understood her, but he spoke after a moment. "Why?"

"I wanted some additional information on werewolves for the assignment," she said. It wasn't entirely untruthful.

The corners of his mouth pulled up in something very close to a smile. It worried her. Snape only ever smiled when something unpleasant was happening to other people. "Very well," he said and spun around and vanished into his office to write her a note of permission.

She followed him as quietly as she could, worried he might grow annoyed and change his mind. Instead he sat and took up a quill. A minute later he held a small piece of parchment for her to take, but as she tugged on the note he refused to relinquish his hold on it. "This will only allow you access to the books on werewolves, Miss Granger… was there anything more specific you were looking for?"

"Um…" she wasn't sure what she was supposed to know. "I was looking to see if there was a potion that helped them."

He definitely smiled then. "In that case, you will need Pettrian's Book of Elixirs. It is also in the Restricted Section." He added the name to the note and let her take it from his hand.

"Thank you, Professor," she said quickly and fought to keep her feet at a reasonable pace as she left his office. Questions consumed her thoughts as she walked at what felt like a painfully slow rate. Why had Snape given her permission? Why was he making sure she knew about the potion? Was it really the same potion he had brewed for Lupin?

As her mind raced, her brain surrendered its hold on her feet and she began to run up the stairs and through the corridors back the way she had just been until she was standing before the pinch-lipped Madam Pince, panting and holding out the note. The woman eyed it and the girl with suspicion and dislike, but led the girl to the gate, unlocking it with a flick of her wand and escorting Hermione into the forbidden stacks. The air crackled with magic more powerfully than in any other location in the castle. Hermione could feel the hair rising on her arms, and received a nasty shock when she accidentally brushed against a book she had no permission to touch. Voices whispered hoarsely, though no one was there to speak. The girl imagined a frightful scenario where a witch or wizard had been absorbed into one of the books and was calling out for help centuries later. She shivered and hurried to keep pace with the librarian.

"Thank you," she said as the woman handed her the last book on werewolves and topped the stack of restricted tomes in the girl's arms with the Book of Elixirs. She went to a small table and began reading Pettrian first. According to Snape, it was the book she needed most. Flipping through, she found the page she wanted.

"Wolfsbane Potion," she muttered. As well-read as she was, she had never heard of it. She read quickly about the history of its recent discovery and the controversy surrounding the distribution to the lesser members of wizarding society. She sniffed at the wording. This Pettrian fellow obviously didn't care for werewolves, but Hermione didn't see how it was their fault that they had been bitten. Maybe one or two were crazy or just violent and intentionally bit people, but most, she was sure, were careful to keep away from people.

So Lupin drank Wolfsbane Potion just before the full moon. A healthy man wouldn't take it, and a smart man wouldn't accept anything from Snape unless he knew what it was. According to Harry, Lupin commented that the potion was a complex one, so he knew what Snape had given him.

That was probably proof enough, but Hermione wanted more. The physical signs weren't definitive. And she truly didn't trust Snape enough to believe he wasn't playing with her. Many potions looked alike. Surely there was another potion with a foul taste and blue smoke, another potion that had absolutely nothing to do with lycanthropy.

What she needed, Hermione decided, was visual proof.

It would have to wait.

The full moon was last night. If Lupin was really a werewolf, then he would have changed back by now. The only thing she would find would be a very tired man, which was hardly proof of anything. Sighing, she returned the books to Madam Pince and went to a quiet corner of the library. She sat in the dim corner for hours, planning. She needed to learn where Lupin's quarters were and what wards he had erected. If the man was a werewolf, there were sure to be wards.

It was dinner time before she finally had a list all made up. As soon as Lupin was back in class, she would begin pestering him for information as subtly as she was able. Lying was never her strong suit, but she couldn't trust Harry or Ron with this. They were better liars, but they might also slip up, or worse, accuse the man outright.

If Lupin was a werewolf, the last thing he needed was to be outed in class.

She sighed and considered throwing her list away. So what if Lupin was a werewolf? He was a fantastic professor and clearly a very nice man. If he turned into a beast monthly, who did it affect other than him? No one.

"Oh, but I have to know," she whined and tucked the list into her bag. She ran to the Great Hall and sat down beside Harry.

"Where've you been?" Ron asked rudely. "You missed class!"

"And why is Snape looking at you like that?" Harry asked, worried.

She glanced over Ron's shoulder and saw Snape was looking her way with a rather satisfied smirk on his face like the proverbial cat that got the canary. "I don't know…" she said quietly and started eating before they noticed she was lying.

As she ate, her mental list expanded – How did Snape know? Why was he trying to tell the students? Why wasn't Dumbledore stopping him?

Hermione hated when the questions outnumbered the answers. By the next full moon she would have as many of them answered as she possibly could.

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A/N: Soooo... what do ya think?


	2. Chapter 2: Caught

Lupin's Secret  
Chapter 2: Caught

Professor Lupin wasn't at breakfast the next morning, which worried Hermione. What if he wasn't a werewolf? What if Snape had intentionally slipped him the wrong potion and he was dying? She shook her head at the ridiculous thought. If he were poisoned, then Snape would have been arrested. Harry had witnessed him bringing the potion to their Defence professor, so Snape could easily be charged and tried.

No, she reasoned, Lupin was just ill and not fit for the noise of the Great Hall. Content with her explanation, the girl dug into her breakfast and hurried to class all worries about poisoning gone from her brain.

But after three days without a single glimpse of the man, Hermione's best logic began to fail. Her brilliant mind began to formulate several scenarios, each more worst-case than the previous, where Remus Lupin was in trouble. Even as she simultaneously sat in Charms taking notes and in the library studying and lay in the Gryffindor tower taking a well-earned nap, she was pacing the corridor in front of his office. She wanted to knock to ensure that Lupin was still alive, but he was sure to know that she ought to be in class.

Pausing, she considered what it was she hoped to accomplish by ambushing the poor man when he was clearly unfit for company. From what she heard, Snape had been acting as supply teacher for all Lupin's classes while he was 'indisposed'. Yet only the third years had been given the werewolf assignment, which Hermione thought was strange. Surely, if it was the man's aim to out Lupin as a lycanthrope, he would have more chance of success if more people were considering the topic. She scoffed at the thought. How many other students put as much effort into their assignments as Hermione? Even if he handed them a Venn Diagram comparing a werewolf and Remus J. Lupin, where everything pointed to him being a werewolf, she doubted that more than a handful would realize what he was on about.

"Is this all for me, then?" she wondered aloud.

Her chest puffed out with pride and she felt absolutely flattered at the thought. He snapped at her, called her an insufferable know-it-all, but when it came to discovering the truth Snape believed she was the only student in the school capable. Even with the evidence staring them in the face, only Hermione Jean Granger could put the pieces together and solve the puzzle.

"Hermione?" a tired voice broke into her thoughts. The girl yelped and spun to see Professor Lupin looking at her from his open doorway. "Why are you pacing outside my office?"

"Uh… oh… I…" she tried to think of an excuse, but all she could do was look at how tired he was and how thin he had grown in just the past week. "Are you all right, Professor?"

His mouth took an odd shape that struck her as being both amused and sad, but why her concern would cause either feeling in the man was beyond her. Well, fine, maybe her reputation as a perfect student might translate into being a teacher's pet, so her concern might cause him some amusement, but she still didn't see why it would sadden him. "I'm fine. Shouldn't you be in class?"

"What?" her observant eyes turned round and she avoided his gaze, choosing instead to study the fine craftsmanship of the door hinge just to the left of his head. "No, I… finished my assignment and am off to the library on an extra credit assignment… but I need a book from the library… which is where I'm going… at the moment…" She trailed off when she realized she was rambling and that anyone with ears could tell that she was lying. "Will you be in class next week?"

Lupin leaned heavily on the solid doorframe. As his hip took most of the weight off his knees and legs, she could see his clothes shift around him. He was even thinner than she had originally thought. If he really was a werewolf, there had to be a metabolic shift that caused such drastic weight loss. "I should be better by then, yes. Has Professor Snape been treating you well?"

She snorted before she could stop herself. "Sorry," she blushed.

"Oh, dear. That bad?"

"No! Not that bad…" she dared a glance at his face and saw an expression that clearly indicated that he didn't believe her. "Well, no worse than he treats everyone in his own class, which is to say not very well at all."

His abrupt movement caught her eye and she found herself staring at him. He folded his arms across his chest, again highlighting how thin both his arms and torso had become in just a few days. She had never seen such rapid weight loss. He sighed, breaking her concentration. "Perhaps I should have a talk with Professor Snape about how he treats my students…" He sounded tired.

"Why bother if you're going to be back next week?" she asked, trying to hide her suspicion. Her question was a loaded one. He couldn't reasonably admit to knowing he would be gone for another week the following month, not without revealing too much to a girl he knew to be too smart.

"It's the principle of the thing, Hermione," he smiled. "As a Gryffindor, I cannot let it go."

'Blast!' she thought. 'He's good.' "Of course," she said, nodding to keep her eyes obscured behind her hair. "You were a Gryffindor?"

"I like to think I still am one," he said.

"That's true. People don't change."

His look darkened. "Unfortunately, some do," he replied quietly. "Though, you'll find the good ones are very slow to."

"Right," said Hermione in a very quiet and confused voice. That had not been a turn she had expected him to take. She wondered who had disappointed him.

"Forgive my mood. My illness does that to me; it's why I avoid people," he pushed himself off the doorframe with some effort. "And, anyway, you are on a mission."

"What?" she asked sharply. "Oh! Yes, my book. For extra credit. Because that is what I was doing… before…" She turned and hurried away before she gave herself away any more than she already had. His soft laugh carried down the corridor to her, and she blushed deeply.

"Oh, drat…" she muttered when she realized she couldn't actually go to the library. She was already there. Nor could she return to the tower. It was another forty minutes at least before the other versions of herself would finally catch up to her current timeline, so she had to find something to do with herself until then.

The Great Hall was open for studying, but there were some Ravenclaws in there from her Arithmancy class that knew her schedule well enough to know that she shouldn't be free at that time of the day. She couldn't very well walk around aimlessly for the next forty minutes. Her feet took her to the cloister on the east side of the castle.

The sun was hidden behind thick clouds. It had been rainy and grim most of the week, but for the moment the rain had let up and it was just rather blustery. She dropped onto a stone bench and leaned against the castle wall, looking out through the arch at the wide expanse of grass. The lake somehow managed to sparkle despite there being no sun shining on it.

Not caring that the sun wasn't shining or that the ground was still wet from the rain that had only ended near midnight, Hermione walked out onto the grass.

The wind whipped at her robes and hair and she could feel the damp chill, but she kept her eyes on the sparkling waves as she ran down to the lakeshore and dropped onto a boulder that had been worn flat by a thousand years of students and dried by a few hours of wind. She glanced around to see if anyone was looking. No one was on the grounds, but she caught movement in a window. Narrowing her eyes, she saw it was Lupin. She turned abruptly and hurried to fish a book from her bag, dropping it onto her lap as if she were reading it.

Although she was afraid to turn around to look, she was sure he was laughing at her again. She fought down her blush because she knew it was stupid to be so flustered. Instead, she turned her face to the wind and enjoyed having a reason for her face being pink.

The rain would begin again soon, so she was determined to enjoy this brief reprieve. Forgetting that a teacher may be watching, she lay back on the rock and closed her eyes. Having already taken a nap, she wasn't afraid of falling asleep.

In the partial darkness behind her eyelids, she could think over the evidence again. She was more convinced than ever that Lupin was a werewolf. Even the worse stomach flu could not have caused him so much weight loss in a few short days. Her mother had once caught Mononucleosis and hadn't lost more than a stone after a month of being unable to hold down anything but tea and dry soup crackers. There was more than a short-lived virus affecting Lupin.

Still, she wanted to know for certain.

She had no reason to be so determined. His being a werewolf had no bearing on his being both a good man and a good teacher. She had no intention of telling anyone, so knowing would do nothing but satisfy her curiosity and ensure she had been correct in her interpretation of the evidence. It was stupid and potentially dangerous, but the only way she could know, truly know without any question or doubt, was to witness Lupin as a werewolf.

Well, she could ask him, but she couldn't imagine him admitting to it. If anything she would be hauled before the Headmaster to have her memory modified.

No, it was first-hand observation or be left forever wondering.

And Hermione hated not knowing.

Shouting and laughter came to her ears. She arched her back to look back at the door without having to sit up, and she could see the other students running through the covered walkway of the cloister, laughing as the wind caught their robes. Classes were out. Her other selves would have vanished by now.

Sighing, she sat up and dusted any telling dirt from her robes, tucked her book back into her bag and headed back into the castle for lunch. She looked up at the sky, which had grown even darker while she lay there. She shivered and realized how cold it really was. Her gaze fell to the castle, she saw Lupin was still leaning on his window, his eyes fixed on the lake, and she wondered what it was that had kept his eyes locked there for the last hour.

'Stop being nosy, Hermione,' she chided herself and hurried into the castle and to the entrance hall, ducking into the doorway of the girls' lavatory as she saw Harry coming around the corner.

"Hermione!" Ron shouted. "Where were you?"

"What are you talking about?" she asked casually, falling into step with them. "I just ran ahead to the loo." Why was it so easy to lie to her friends but lying to Lupin made her stutter stupidly? The man was a stranger. Lying to him ought to have been far easier. Fear and respect for authority was the only thing she could think of.

"Right," Ron muttered, unconvinced.

"Honestly, Ronald," she sighed and marched ahead into the Great Hall, settling down on the bench and ignoring his narrowed eyes. "Harry, are you ready for the game? It doesn't look as if the weather will turn; are you prepared for a rainy match?"

That got Ron's mind off Hermione's unexplained disappearance. He turned to Harry and started going on about the Chudley Cannons and their famous Thunderstorm Match of 1987 against Puddlemere United, where three players had been struck by lightning yet the game still went on for over fourteen hours. She hid her smile by biting down on her sandwich, and didn't interrupt their Quidditch talk for the length of lunch.

That ought to have clued the boys into their being something going on with her, but they didn't pick up on it.

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A/N: I admit that it is highly unlikely that Snape would have so much free time in his schedule to allow him to teach every single one of Lupin's classes… and I'm sure more than one of the time slots would interfere with his own Potions classes. But for the sake of the story, I'm just running with it. Suspend your disbelief for me here.

And, yes, even with a 10-chapter story, I can't hold off updating for more than two days. Such lack of will power... shameful.

*Just added a poll to my profile page. Vote to decide which story I post next!


	3. Chapter 3: Death by Anticipation

A/N: Another push for the POLL on my profile page. Cast your vote to determine which story I will post next.  
Lupin's Secret is only a 10-chapter story, and with my complete lack of will power it will be finished in no time! So cast your vote TODAY!

THANK YOU for reading and reviewing and signing up for alerts. Those emails make my day!... why else do you think I post so often? :)

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Lupin's Secret  
Chapter 3: Death by Anticipation

Hermione wondered if it was possible to die from anticipation. She was constantly nervous with excitement, her fingers tapping out impatient rhythms on her thigh while she was supposed to be studying. She had to repeat hours more often than was prudent because she wasn't able to concentrate. If anyone tried to use any one of the usually unoccupied classrooms on the third floor, they would open the door to find Hermione Granger sitting and having a tremendously difficult time focusing on her assignments. On her worse day so far, she had been in a dozen rooms simultaneously on top of being in the Great Hall for dinner and the Gryffindor tower sleeping.

It was the full moon.

It would be rising in three more nights, not that anyone would see it through the thick clouds and blinding rain. No magical meteorologist was necessary to know what Monday night's weather would be. It had been raining since October, and would likely remain doing so through Christmas. Hermione wished it would stop, so she could get some of her agitation out with some outdoor physical activity; pacing worriedly in an empty classroom wasn't having quite the calming affect she needed.

With the rain coming almost constantly, she had no outlet for her nervous energy.

If anyone deserved to be so affected by the moon, it was Remus Lupin, but he was positively relaxed compared to Hermione. She glanced around Ron's head to look at him at the high table. He looked slightly ill but was hardly clawing at the furniture.

Snape's lips still curled in a satisfied smile every time he looked at her, knowing she was as eager to put her reading to the test as he was to have Lupin's secret discovered. She still wasn't sure how Snape knew Lupin's secret or why he was so determined that she discover it. Jealousy was all she could determine. The Potions master couldn't possibly hate him for just being a werewolf. Her reading had indicated that werewolves had always been rather mistrusted, but that the current level of hatred and prejudice stemmed from Voldemort's use of them in the wizarding war that had claimed Harry's parents. If Snape was as Dark a wizard as he often seemed, then he would not hate the lycanthrope for being what he is. So it had to be because Lupin had the job that Snape wanted.

She hated the idea that she might somehow be playing into Snape's hands; that in discovering Lupin's secret, she might be giving Snape what he wanted… whatever that was. It was nearly enough to make her ignore the questions and go back to dealing with her impossible course load and helping Harry keep himself away from the escaped prisoner who was trying to break into Gryffindor tower to kill him. That was enough stress and danger without having to pile a werewolf on top of it.

'What must it be like to be Lavender Brown?' she wondered and glanced down the table at the girl who chatted happily, if vapidly, with her friends. She frowned as she tried to imagine herself being like that. It wasn't even a possibility. Shaking her head, she ate and let her foot take up the anxious rhythm while her hands busied themselves with the cutlery.

She slept well thanks to the Dreamless Sleep potion she managed to get her hands on.

Lying to obtain a potion she didn't really need was never smart, but she wanted to be well-rested for Defence Against the Dark Arts the following morning. If she was tired as well as nervous and excited, then she would certainly miss valuable visual clues as well as potentially endangering a classmate with a misplaced spell should they be practicing defensive spells.

Entering the classroom immediately after breakfast, she spied the large goblet on Lupin's desk. The blue smoke was rising gently off the surface just as Pettrian had described it. She had searched Book of Elixirs twice more, but the text had not mentioned any other potions that had blue smoke.

Pettrian may have been bigoted, but he was a thorough cataloger of potions and draughts. If he didn't mention the blue smoke on any other page of the book, then it was unique to Wolfsbane Potion.

According to Pettrian, Damocles Belby had not discovered the potion until the late 1970s, the precise date was up for debate as the controversy surrounding its discovery and distribution had led the wizard to withhold his invention for a period of a few years. Hermione hated that a potion that could help such damaged people might have never been learned of because the wizarding world was so prejudiced against werewolves. She couldn't imagine the concern Lupin felt for what he did during the full moon, when his body was out of his control.

The idea struck her that he had lived at least sixteen years without Wolfsbane Potion to aid his transformation. Tears began to cloud her vision as she thought of him struggling with his fears of what the wolf did.

"Miss Granger," Lupin said softly very close to her ear, "is everything all right?"

Hermione squeaked in surprise, jumping slightly at his proximity. "Yes, sir."

"You're crying," he pointed out. "Most people don't cry without a reason."

"What? No, I stubbed my toe," she lied. It didn't sound any more convincing than the last time she lied to him.

He narrowed his eyes and leaned in to study her face as she tried very hard not to look guilty. "I must have missed that," he replied, a smile pulling at his mouth. As he stood up straighter, he sniffed the air and frowned.

"It's probably the potion on your desk," Hermione pointed. "It doesn't smell very nice."

"Doesn't taste very nice, either," he commented with a grimace. Lupin left her no time to question what it was as he went to his desk and drained the goblet. His head fell back as he drank the potion down, his adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed it. Hermione cringed, imagining the taste. His reaction didn't help her assumptions of just how disgusting the potion had been. His face contorted as he wiped the last of it from his hand, his eyes watering slightly as if it had physically pained him to drink it. Even through teary eyes, her concern was obvious.

"Just a preventative," he assured her.

She nodded as if it was perfectly normal, and sat down to wait for the rest of the class to come it.

She was early. It had seemed a good idea at the time, but now she was left alone in the room with Lupin. The nervous energy had not dissipated after her dreamless night; her heel bounced a hurried beat while her fingernails tapped an equally fast code against the wooden tabletop. She had already taken out her book and her notebook and her quill and ink. With twenty minutes to go, she had nothing to do but sit and try not to show just how nervous she was.

She failed. Lupin sat at his desk grading papers from the previous class, but he kept looking up at her. Her presence was not out of the ordinary, she always arrived first and always well before anyone else. He usually went about his business preparing for the lesson until she started asking him questions. Today she had no questions that wouldn't show her to be single-mindedly focused on lycanthropy and the people who suffer from it. As eager as she was for information about his personal experience as a werewolf, she didn't dare ask him. So, she sat in unnatural silence.

"No questions for me today?" he asked, his face indicated he was amused, but his tone sounded concerned. She bit her lip at the thought that he might know what she had planned.

"Sorry, I'm preoccupied," she apologized and racked her brain for a question that might make him uncomfortable enough to leave her alone. "Uh… I was curious about the Bogart's reactions to people."

His face became determinedly fixed. He looked amused, but she could see the tension around his eyes and mouth as he fought to keep it looking that way. He nodded. "You've already asked about that," he replied, his tone betraying his suspicion.

"Yes, well this was more about its reaction to you," she said slowly. The man's deepest fears were not something he would care to discuss with a student, so she hoped he would dismiss her queries and turn back to grading.

Lupin just nodded and waited for her to continue.

"Well, I don't understand what form it took," she said. "It was just a ball. A big, glowing ball. No offense, Professor, but what's so scary about that?"

His forced amusement relaxed into an easy smile. "That depends on its size," he replied and gave no further explanation, choosing instead to turn his attention back to marking the essays. She sighed, happy to have his eyes looking elsewhere. As hard as she had tried to not look at him, he was now trying not to look at her. Hermione could see the muscles of his neck tightening periodically as he fought to keep from looking up.

This strange stalemate gave her the ability to study him without fear of what he might think. His whole body seemed tense, but that might have been because of her questions and not the coming full moon. His skin looked pale and slightly off color; it was the same queasy shade Harry had turned when his arm had been broken by a bludger. So he was in physical pain, she reasoned. He hid it well. Though, after so many years of lycanthropy he would be good at masking his condition. She realized she didn't know exactly how old this new professor was. He looked to be in his late thirties or very early forties, but werewolves were often found to look considerably older than their years because of the strain of the disease. She wondered when he had been bitten.

"Come in," Lupin called, breaking Hermione's concentration. She blushed furiously, afraid she had been caught staring. The other students began taking their seats noisily, scraping chairs and shifting desks. Harry and Ron dropped down next to her and she relaxed.

"Hermione," Harry said slowly, as if he were about to ask her a terribly important question. She tensed and her hand automatically gripped the Time-Turner under her robes.

"Yes?"

"Can I borrow your ink?"

She laughed, a note of hysteria in her voice. All the time travel and games trying to catch a werewolf and evade a mass murderer were getting to her. "Yes, Harry. That's fine."

"Is everything all right?" He asked as he moved the bottle between them. "You seem a bit jumpy."

"Just tired. I've a lot of classes," she waved the concern away and turned to face Lupin, who she saw shift abruptly. He had been watching her. 'He knows,' Hermione worried privately. 'He knows that I'm watching him, looking for signs. He knows I suspect he's a werewolf.'

The man cleared his throat and began the lesson. Her hand took notes, but the words never managed to enter her brain. She was too busy considering what Lupin's knowledge might mean. Would he want to talk to her about it? Explain himself or offer her the chance to question him? Probably not. He would most likely just reinforce the wards on his office and quarters to keep her from breaking in on Monday night.

The previous day while he was teaching the fourth year Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws, Hermione had successfully breached the wards on his office without alerting anyone. She had found that there were no wards blocking her from going from his office into his personal quarters. In fact, the door had been left wide open.

Tempting as it was to poke around, she didn't want to be rude and left after a glance through the open door.

She had no intention of riffling through the man's personal belongings Monday night. All she wanted was to see if, instead of a six-foot-two-and-a-bit man, there was a considerably larger, furrier werewolf. If she was hidden beneath an invisibility cloak, he would never know that she was there. The plan was far from sensible, she knew, but after a month of growing curiosity she could not let it pass.

It was so tempting to try using her Time-Turner to skip ahead to the full moon. But that was strictly against the rules. She would just have to wait the few days.

Waiting… It was almost as bad as not knowing.


	4. Chapter 4: Stupid Plan

Lupin's Secret  
Chapter 4: Stupid Plan

Surprisingly, Lupin was at breakfast Monday morning. Though given how much greener he looked than he had Thursday, Hermione didn't expect him to be there at lunch, and he wasn't. His absence didn't draw much attention. Neither Harry nor Ron pointed it out, but the space he should have occupied practically shouted at Hermione. When she woke that morning, she had started to reconsider her plan to break into the man's private office and quarters, but the glaringly empty seat at the high table spurred her on. By dinner she was tapping her shoes impatiently against the legs of her chair, wishing for time to speed up.

"What's with you?" Ron asked pointedly, never one for tact. He was never one for being observant, either, but even he had taken notice of her growing edginess.

"Nothing!" she snapped. He had been asking her that daily for a week and it was wearing thin. She had enough to worry about without Ron finally taking the opportunity to use his eyes. "I have a lot to do and I want dinner to end so I can get to it."

"Yeah…" he muttered.

Harry, ever the clever boy, followed her eye to the seat Lupin was not in. "Worried about Lupin?" She nodded. "I'm sure he's fine. He's been looking a bit peaky lately."

She managed to suppress the nervous giggles and nod her agreement, thinking, 'You'd look peaked, too, if you had magic and hormones coursing through your whole body, forcing you into a werewolf!' This was not something she could say at the dinner table, if she could say it at all. It wasn't her secret to tell, and she would hate to jeopardize the relationship that Harry had with Lupin. She knew Harry to be very accepting, but how would he react to finding his new mentor was a lycanthrope?

"So, I was thinking…" Hermione said quietly, "about that assignment Snape gave us last month…"

"The werewolf essay?" Harry asked.

"The essay only you wrote?" Ron added none too politely.

"Forgive me for actually doing my assignments in a timely manner," she snarled at him, but collected herself. "Yes, the werewolf essay. I think it interesting that anyone might be one." Harry nodded, though he clearly didn't see the point she was aiming at. "I mean, anyone we know could secretly suffer from lycanthropy… turn into a werewolf…"

Ron shivered. "Mum and dad used to threaten us with them as kids." His voice took on a nasal tone as he imitated his mother, "If you don't clean your room, a werewolf will sneak in on the next full moon and eat you up!'"

"That's horrid!" Hermione's mouth fell open. "It's not their fault for being what they are! I can't imagine how horrible it must be to not know what the werewolf does on that one night, the worry they must go through all month long. It must be terrible living with that worry."

"Calm down, Hermione," Harry said and slapped Ron on the arm for upsetting her.

"Would you hate them?" she asked.

"Who?"

"The werewolf," she said, keeping her eyes fixed on his so that she wouldn't look directly to Lupin's empty seat. "Would you hate someone if you discovered they were a werewolf?"

He blinked, clearly dumbstruck by the random turn of the conversation, but she could see he was considering the question. Harry was always good for a well-thought, if somewhat brief, answer. "No," he said with certainty. "Like you said, it's not their fault."

She sighed and nodded happily at his reply.

"Are you trying to tell us something?" Ron asked, his eyes narrowed, and she froze. "Are you a werewolf?"

The laughter came out of her and she made no effort to stop it. Of course Ron would completely miss the signs, but assume her questions were leading him to the answer. "No, Ronald, I am not a lycanthrope. I was just curious."

"Oh."

"Well, I have a lot to do, and can't seem to focus on eating…" she said and stood. Dinner wasn't over yet, but she couldn't stick around now that she had turned Harry and Ron to the topic of werewolves. Thick as they often could be, she was sure even they could piece together Lupin's secret if she was there glancing at his vacant chair. She didn't want to accidentally give anything away because she was too distracted to listen properly.

Taking the opportunity provided by an empty Gryffindor tower, Hermione ran up to the third year boys' dormitory and easily broke into Harry's trunk. She really should talk to him about the lax security he kept on his personal belongings. If she were Sirius Black, she could easily have planted something dangerous among his things.

Then again, if he was more vigilant about his security, she wouldn't be able to get her hands on his invisibility cloak without asking permission. Gaining permission would require an explanation.

She shook her head and decided to let Harry learn his lesson the hard way.

His invisibility cloak was not difficult to locate and she tucked it into her bag, closing the trunk and replacing the pitiful wards. She hurried back down the stairs and up to her own dorm to deposit her books and pace until the moon rose.

Seeing Lupin transform would be the greatest proof of all, but she wasn't foolish enough to be in the same room while he was in such pain. Wolfsbane Potion or no, no one could possibly think straight when their bones and muscles were being so altered, and he might easily lash out at her without realizing what he was doing.

She heard the girls on the stairs and scrambled to throw herself onto her bed as if she had been reading the whole time.

"I don't understand how you can read so much without going blind," Parvati said as she saw Hermione eagerly turning the page of her book.

"It's fun," Hermione insisted as calmly as she could. Inside she was thrumming with excitement and just wanted to leap out of bed and away from the books everyone seemed to think she was married to.

Lavender and Parvati just shook their heads at how sad she was. These other girls of her age couldn't hold a conversation with her for long; they only ever talked to her when they wanted help on their homework. Hermione had once spoken to Parvati's sister, Padma, and found her to be much easier to talk with. Padma had a much higher value of reading and studying than her sister, though she found both Patil girls were quick to change the topic of conversation to clothes and boys if given the opportunity.

Sighing, she lay in bed pretending to read until the other girls went to sleep. The old fashioned mechanical clock on her bedside table informed her that it was ten o'clock, well after moonrise. She slipped from her bed and put on the invisibility cloak, walking silently down the stairs and through the common room.

"Who's there?" the Fat Lady demanded as her portrait was pushed open, seemingly by no one. "I haven't been so confused since the 1970s! All these invisible students..." She huffed and grumbled about how ill-used she was as Hermione walked silently away.

'Stupid,' she told herself. 'This is stupid. This is reckless. This is dangerous. This is very, very, very not smart.' The girl knew her thoughts to be both sensible and accurate, but she kept moving forward. Her curiosity was too strong to be denied. After a month of speculation she wanted proof positive, so her trainers kept taking steps away from the dorm and closer to Lupin's door.

"Just turn around," she whispered to herself even as her hand was poised on the handle of his office door. But her fingers gripped and her wrist rotated and the door didn't open. "See, locked. Just go back," she said, rationally. But her wand waved and removed all the wards, which she was not at all surprised had been doubled since she had last checked.

'Of course he would add extra safety measures,' she thought. 'He may be a werewolf, but he's not stupid.'

Wards down, door unlocked, she turned the handle again. The door opened silently, swinging inward. She followed it closely, using it as a shield between herself and whatever lay inside. She hoped, oh how she hoped, that she was very wrong, that Lupin would be in bed and asleep and she would not come into contact with a large, furry beast.

The low rumble informed her that she was very much _not_ wrong.

She was, in fact, correct on all accounts.

Peering around the door, she saw nothing. The office was empty and dark. Heavy shadows hung around every piece of furniture, making it nearly impossible for her to see where the rumble was coming from. The sound, while frightening, was not a threat. It sounded more like snoring. The possibility that Werewolf Lupin was sleeping gave her the courage to slip into the office, closing and re-warding the door behind her. As much as she wanted to leave herself a quick escape route, she didn't dare leave the door open for him to exit into the halls.

Straining her ears, she crept along in the dark, following the sounds of the breathing. Each step brought her nearer to his desk, where he had sat with her while she had bombarded him with questions regarding the day's lesson on more than one occasion. He had nodded and answered her thoroughly, all the while wearing a curious smile much like the one he had worn when he caught her pacing outside his door.

Actually, he always looked at her with a sad and amused smile, only her and never anyone else.

'Perhaps it is strange that I ask so many questions,' she thought as she stubbed her toe on the chair in front of the desk.

She bit down on her tongue to keep from screaming and reached out to steady the chair before it fell. Her efforts only made it worse; the chair legs scraped against the stone floor, breaking the silence with a piercing noise.

She froze in place and listened. The rumbling stopped, an odd and irregular clicking taking its place.

Click.

Swallowing her fear, she turned to look in the direction of the noise.

Click.

She gripped her wand beneath the invisibility cloak. Her nervous hands were so sweaty, she nearly lost her hold on it.

Click.

She saw the snout, the nose shining and wet in the dim light coming through the windows.

Click.

The golden eyes glowed in the darkness, seeing everything in a way she could not. She fought her fear-fueled muscles to keep still as Lupin took another step, his sharp nails clicking as his paw touched the stone floor.

Click.

He turned around the corner of the desk.

Click.

His whole body came into view. He was huge. As a man, he was tall. As a wolf, he was terrifyingly so. Walking on four legs, his shoulder was nearly as high as hers. If he stood on two legs, he had to be well over eight feet tall. This had been a bad idea. What could she hope to accomplish by coming into the room with an eight-foot-tall werewolf?

Click.

She struggled to keep her breathing shallow and quiet. Her heart raced to be in such proximity with one of the most dangerous creatures in the wizarding world. He stepped closer, his black nose inches from the invisibility cloak. Without thinking, she shuffled back. The heel of her trainer caught on the hem of Harry's cloak and she stumbled backward, crashing into the chair she had stubbed her toe on just seconds before, knocking it sideways as she fell. She only just managed to keep from crying out as her elbow hit the floor painfully.

Determined not to scream, Hermione bit down on her tongue; her resolve was tested immediately as Lupin drew closer. He took in a long breath through his nose, and Hermione cringed at her stupidity. She had been so concerned about hiding her physical person, but a canine's best sense was that of smell. She could wear all the invisibility cloaks she wanted and he could still smell her.

Until that moment, he probably thought it was Harry invading his office. The cloak was most likely saturated with the boy's scent, masking her aroma. But now her feet and legs were free of the cloak and he could smell her.

He took in another long breath, scenting the air. The new smells made him tense; she could see his eyes narrow in the darkness, honing in on her. His nails clicked against the floor again as he inched closer, following his nose. Hermione squeaked despite her best efforts as the snout came under the invisibility cloak and pushed it away.

'This was such a bad idea,' she screamed at herself as she realized she hadn't even told anyone where she was, not even a note left under her pillow just in case. Her options were few and poor, but she rushed through them quickly. Sit and be mauled or run and be mauled.; he was so close now that she couldn't even spin the Time-Turner without bringing him along with her, which would just defeat the purpose.

So stay or run.

* * *

A/N: Kudos to the two or three of you that commented on how foolish Hermione was for not remembering that a wolf would smell her. Give the poor girl a break, she's tired and over-worked. Something is bound to give.

I've decided to leave the POLL open until chapter 7, which would be around 22 September if I manage to maintain my current rate of posting. Coincidentally, that is also the first day of school here.

THANK YOU to those reading, reviewing and signing up for alerts. You realize that the reason I post so often is to keep the emails flowing into my inbox, right? So review and I'll become even MORE addicted and post MORE often. :)


	5. Chapter 5: The Find

A/N: Well, after insisting that review and alert emails make me update faster, and getting quite a goodly number of emails after the last chapters, I couldn't renege, now could I?

If I requested cookies, would you have sent them for a quicker update?

* * *

Lupin's Secret  
Chapter 5: The Find

Much as she liked to think of herself as a pure Gryffindor, Hermione knew that discretion was the better part of valor and that a strategic retreat was often a very wise choice. There was little point in being bravest of them all if one didn't live to see the final battle. Similarly, there was no point in facing a werewolf if she couldn't live to put her new discovery to good use… even if that use was a smug smile and personal contentment at a mystery accurately solved. This seemed like an excellent situation for an advance to the rear.

Bracing herself for an attack, Hermione threw the cloak off and scrambled to her feet, stumbling into the chairs by Lupin's desk as she stood. The sudden motions and noises startled the wolf more than the odd smells had, and he bristled and growled. His glowing golden eyes locked onto hers and she swore there was fear in them. She backed away slowly, too slowly for her liking, but she didn't dare to make any more abrupt movements. The Wolfsbane potion, according to Pettrian, gave Lupin control over his body during the full moon, but she didn't know how much and if having a human in the room would make the wolf harder to control.

'Options,' she thought desperately. 'I need options.'

Escape was her first and favorite choice. The door to the corridor was now blocked by Lupin's massive figure. It was also locked and warded. She knew the door to his personal quarters was behind her and probably unlocked. Was he in a right enough mind to care if a student went into his room? At that particular moment, she really didn't care. Hermione would happily accept detention and loss of points for the infraction rather than spend the night staring into the eyes of a werewolf.

'Stupid idea,' she repeated and began inching left toward the door to his room.

Lupin noticed the change in her direction and growled angrily. If he hoped the threat would deter her, he was disappointed; it only made Hermione move quicker. He snarled and bared his teeth, clearly trying to keep her from going into his room. Hermione's frayed nerves couldn't stand it any longer. She had been living thirty-seven-hour days for the past two weeks and was simply incapable of dealing with this in any manner befitting a girl of her maturity and intelligence – she screamed and ran.

Her hands hit the handle on the door, twisting and pushing simultaneously while hoping that it was still unlocked as it had been the previous week. She was lucky, and she knew it. The door flew open, and she began to close it even before she was fully inside the room. Locked and warded against the werewolf, she fell against the heavy door, her knees giving out.

Lupin pawed at the door, his nails scratching the ancient wood. She braced herself for the anger, the snarls and growls and to feel his full weight crash against it. Instead he started whining plaintively.

He was begging her to come out.

"Why would he not want me in here?" she muttered, perplexed. If Lupin was aware enough to know who she was and where she was, then, surely, he would want her safely locked in another room. Perhaps the problem was the particular room in which she had locked herself. This was his room. His personal room filled with his personal things.

"Lucerna Lumos," she said, igniting the candles in the room.

Lupin scratched more insistently, and whined louder. 'Don't look,' he was telling her in that pitiable cry. 'Please, don't look.'

"What else could you possibly be hiding, Professor?" she wondered, certain that a man could have no deeper secret than being a lycanthrope. Her glance from the doorway on her previous clandestine visit had shown nothing worth investigating – books, a few suits and little else. He had arrived at the castle with minimal personal affects, all of which seemed to fit easily into two traveling trunks. She stood and walked farther into the room; even as Lupin scratched harder at the door and turned from whines to growls, curiosity began to burn inside her again.

The bed was made, a rumpled suit laying on it as if he had tossed it there absently. She blushed as she realized he had probably taken off all his clothes before the full moon rose. The idea somehow made him seem more naked, and she looked away quickly. Averting her eyes from the clothes and the bed, she looked at the bedside table, where a thick book sat. "Travers' Guide to Magical Medicines," she read and lifted the weighty book, opening to the page where a broken quill acted as a bookmark. "Mandrakes..." she flipped through the book, but found it nothing worth threatening her over and put it back where she found it.

His wardrobe was neatly arranged with suits, robes, cloaks and two pairs of jeans. Everything was worn and had been repaired in at least one location. The bureau held more clothes of equal age and condition. Even his jumpers had been darned where they were torn or worn through.

"Well, that can't be what you're so upset about," she said and closed the bottom drawer.

So that left only the books. She turned and walked to his desk and to the bookcase alongside it. The books were the sort she would often be seen borrowing from the library – thick, leather-bound tomes of facts, histories and otherwise useful information. He had books on Transfiguration, Charms and Potions, as well as books on Dragons and Vampires. His private library covered everything he would need to teach his class, though, she noted, he was clearly missing any books on werewolves.

Unless he was the sort to jealously guard his personal books, they were obviously not what he was trying to keep her from. She groaned and fell into his chair, the springs creaking under her weight. Her body went rigid at the sound. She had been very careful to move silently even with the door separating her from Lupin. At the sound of angry springs, Lupin began snarling furiously and digging his nails into the door more damagingly.

"It's here, then," she said triumphantly, though still very quietly, and her eyes hunted the desk. It was cluttered with parchment, notebooks and broken quills. There were several empty cups from tea and a plate with half a sandwich on it. Disappointment filled her. Did he not want her to see how messy he was? Or not to steal the last of his sandwich? She gave the parchments and notebooks a half-hearted looking over, but found they were all just rough notes for his lessons. It was very disappointing. She leaned heavily on the desk, flinching as her injured elbow hit on something considerably harder than a pile of parchment and scrolls.

Her fingers itched with excitement as she lifted the parchment again, digging deeper into the pile this time. Under a three-inch stack of parchment scrolls, sat a book. It looked little different than any other book he owned, thinner perhaps but still fairly thick and leather-bound. The cover held no title nor did the spine. She frowned as she examined the exterior. The leather was worn and discolored slightly as if it was a very old book, but it wasn't cracked like many old books were. So it was worn from handling and not age. This was a book he read often, a favorite. Setting it down on the desk, she hesitated. If this was what he didn't want her to see, did she really have a right to look at it?

Hermione bit her lip as she debated the question. Lupin was still snarling and scratching at the door, trying desperately to keep her from discovering his other secret. What could be worse than having her learn he was a werewolf? That deeply worrying question and her love of books were what pushed her hand into opening the cover of Lupin's book.

The inside cover was marbled paper, top quality and heavy. She gently turned the page expecting a title page. There was a title of sorts. 'Letters 1976 – 1979,' it read with no further explanation, author, copyright date or anything she would expect in a book. Even the ancient illuminated manuscripts in the Hogwarts library had more information on their title pages. She turned the useless title page and found the next was made of parchment, yellowed slightly from age, but still in very good condition.

"Well, it wasn't descriptive," she commented, "but it was accurate." The parchment held a letter by the look of the layout. The single, two-word line at the top had to be the address and there was what looked like a signature after a brief hand-written passage that filled barely half the page. She flipped through the rest of the pages and saw each one was a letter, some of the later ones filled two pages of parchment, while others barely filled one.

"So this is what you didn't want me to see? Letters?" she considered what the letters might contain. Private information, most likely.

Having no intention of reading the personal correspondence bound in the book, she pulled a few candles closer. All she wanted to see was if the letters were all to the same person. In the brighter light, she could read the address of the first letter. 'Dear Remus,' it read, as did the second, third, fourth and most every other letter in the book. Occasionally she read 'Remus J. Lupin' and more than a few were addressed to 'My love,' but she was sure it amounted to the same thing. They were love letters.

So Lupin had bound the love letters he had received. She considered the weight and quality of the marbled paper and the leather cover again. For a man with so little to his name and such thread-bare clothing, he sure had spent a lot to have this book made. Who was this woman – she assumed it was a woman – who had so affected him?

"It's not your business," she told herself curtly, slapping the book shut and putting it down at arm's length on the desk. She stood and walked away, determined not to nose about in the poor man's business any more than she already had. He had enough troubles without some stupid little girl poking her fingers around in his proverbial dirty underwear. As she thought that, she found herself looking at his rumpled trousers on the bed. She clicked her tongue as she realized how stupid she was being. She had already poked around his literal dirty underwear, what was a bit of poking into the proverbial sort, too?

She hurried back across the room and opened the book again, flipping excitedly to the first letter. Her eyes scanned the page, respectfully ignoring the body and skipping straight to the signature.

'Sincerely, H.' She frowned as she read it.

"Well, that's completely unhelpful," the girl grumbled and turned to the next. Again the author signed it with only an initial. She flipped through the book, looking at each signature, and it seemed the sender only ever signed with one letter, H. Hermione was about to give up, when she found the only letter where the sender bothered to use more than his or her initial. It was the last letter, signed, 'Hermione.'

"Hermione," she gasped and stared at it again. "Hermione?"

No, that wasn't right. How many Hermiones were there in the world? She had never met another. She had only ever seen the name in books – Shakespeare and books about the mythical Trojan War. It was a name never heard in the Muggle world, and one that, she found, was unique in the wizarding world, as well. What were the odds of Remus J. Lupin being in love with a woman who shared her rare name?

* * *

A/N: Chapter 5, in which we learn of the author's undying love of hand-written correspondence.


	6. Chapter 6: Dear Remus

Lupin's Secret  
Chapter 6: Dear Remus

All thoughts of respecting what was left of Lupin's privacy fell away as she turned back to the first letter and read. She was intrigued by this other Hermione and could not let it go. Even as Lupin clawed at the door and alternated between begging and threatening, she scooted up closer to the desk and started reading.

'Dear Remus,

'I'm sorry for the cold way I've treated you. Please understand that I don't hate you and that I'm not angry with you. I can't really explain, but believe me when I tell you that, while I have nothing against you, I cannot get involved with you.

'It's complicated, which I'm sure reads as a very trite excuse, but it is an honest one. There are circumstances that I cannot relate that prevent me from being even a friend to you.

'So, while I'm extremely flattered by your offer, I can't possibly take you up on it. Have you asked Edlyn Noble? I heard her talking in Charms yesterday, and I think she would be more than receptive.

'Sincerely,  
'H.  
'3 October 1976'

"That's it?" she said, annoyed. That was the reason he was still snarling at the door? There had to be more to it than that. She turned the impersonal letter aside and found the next. It was longer and written in the same neat handwriting as the first, a handwriting that looked rather like her own.

'Dear Remus,

'I'm sorry if you think I'm being inconsiderate and cryptic. I thought I was being more than honest and as forthcoming as my situation allows. Alright, I can see how that might read as being purposefully vague, but I have promised someone very important to me that I would not get close to anyone while I'm visiting. Additionally, I don't know how long I'll be visiting, so getting too close to anyone might lead to considerable complications when it's finally time for me to go home.

'I meant what I wrote last time. I really don't hate you. To the contrary, I like you very much. I had a very nice time speaking with you at the Three Broomsticks last weekend. It was more fun than I have had in quite some time. I'm not telling you this to encourage you, just to make you know I bear no ill feelings toward you.

'You really should talk to Edlyn Noble. She was very excited to see you, and I think she would very happily take you up on that offer you made me.

'As for the supposed wound to your ego and pride… I think you have more than enough of both to deal with a little rejection. So the next time you come strutting up to me, I will be more than happy to knock you down a peg or two. Those friends of yours are a very bad influence.

'Sincerely,  
'H.  
'5 October 1976'

Hermione really wished that Remus had copies of the letter he sent in reply to H's. The woman or girl kept referring to an offer, but she had no idea what it was the young Lupin had suggested. And she wondered about his friends that were such a bad influence. She couldn't believe Lupin, even as a young man, would have friends that were anything but studious. Although, she was certain some thought that of her, and her friends were often found breaking rules and getting into trouble. So perhaps appearances were deceiving where Remus J. Lupin was concerned.

She eagerly turned the page to read on. The next letter was longer but more of the same, vague references to promises made and not being able to accept his offer, whatever it was, and insisting that she didn't hate him. Hermione didn't see why this woman was putting so much effort into denying what she felt for Lupin.

"The lady doth protest too much," she muttered and turned the 7 October 1976 letter over and read the next from the following week.

'Dear Remus,

'Oh, you are a drama queen, aren't you?

'Yes, I did notice your absence from Friday classes, but only because there was a very pleasant silence that allowed me to actually listen to the professors speak! There was also a delightful excess of personal space. Normally, I have you hanging all over me, slipping me notes and whispering when I'm trying very hard to actually pay attention. I realize it's a tricky concept, but you do realize we are in class to learn, yes?

'So whatever it is that kept you from classes Friday, please tell me it is long-lasting because I would so enjoy it if you were out of class for the rest of this week.

'And, no, being on your deathbed will not convince me to give you the last request of a grievously ill man, so don't even try that one on me. It might work on Edlyn, though.

'Do not get better soon,  
'H.  
'11 October 1976'

Hermione frowned. That was very rude. Lupin was probably recovering from a full moon and this H woman was being so mean to him. She huffed indignantly on the man's behalf and turned the page angrily, reading more insults about his absence from class being a joy and encouraging him to stay sick for as long as possible. Grumbling at how plainly unfeeling H was to Lupin, she kept reading.

'Dear Remus,

'What makes you think I can be goaded into something I've told you I don't want to do?

'I thought those friends of yours were bad, but I'm starting to think it might be _you_ who is the bad influence. I feel sorry for Peter and Sirius, as you have clearly worked your magic on them. Poor boys never stood a chance against you. No comment on James.

'And I'll be telling Edlyn just what you had to say about her. I think she'll be very hurt. If you want to make it up to her, then you can take her to that concert you've been pestering me about. Maybe she is musically inept with the taste of a five-year-old, but with a good teacher I'm sure she'll come to love the Sex Pistols as much as you do. You can ask me all you like, but I won't be going to the concert with you. I probably won't be here for it anyway.

'Did I tell you how much nicer it was when you weren't in class? Because having your arm on the back of my chair was extremely annoying during Transfiguration today. I like it much better when there was an empty chair and Sirius was taking notes for you. Have I mentioned how lovely he is when you aren't there convincing him to do, quite frankly, ridiculous things? Now, if _he_ were to ask me to the concert, I'd probably say yes.

'H.  
'14 October 1976'

She paused as she read the last paragraph and the name it contained. Sirius.

Much like her own name, it was one she had never heard outside of mythology before the start of this past summer. It was in the Daily Prophet constantly because of Sirius Black's unprecedented escape from Azkaban. How many Siriuses could there be? Not many, Hermione would wager. So was this Sirius from 1976 the same one she had read about in the papers? She paled to think about H writing about him so sweetly, though Hermione suspected it was only done to make Remus jealous.

Again, she wished that she had Remus's reply to see how he had reacted to the flirtatious words.

'Dear Remus,

'I am sorry to hear about the fight you and Sirius had.'

"You didn't!" Hermione squealed and glanced at the door where Lupin was still scratching. Professor Lupin got into a fight over H? She couldn't believe that her seemingly mild-mannered teacher would do something so brash even in his youth. It struck her that she didn't even know how old Lupin had been in 1976. Scanning her memory, she remembered from an article that Sirius Black was born in late 1959, so assuming that the Sirius H was writing about was the same one, then he would have been in his sixth year at Hogwarts. So he and Remus would have been about sixteen years old.

The seat springs groaned as she sat back in the chair. She tried to imagine Lupin as Remus. Sixteen and overly confident, hanging over a girl who clearly liked him though she refused to admit it; obsessing over Sex Pistols concerts and insulting anyone who didn't like them. Would he have worn his hair in a crazy mohawk? She couldn't picture it. It was difficult enough for her to imagine him young at all.

Shaking her head at the mental image she was creating, she turned back to the letter.

'I'm sorry to hear about the fight you and Sirius had. I went to visit him in the hospital wing this morning. You will feel very bad to know that you punched him hard enough to break his jaw and his nose. He is quite pitiful right now. His eyes are both swollen shut. And he can't even feed himself.

'Madam Pomfrey told me his bones can't be healed immediately because he's in such bad shape, and that he won't be released for at least a week. He was grateful for the company James and I provided, and was so sad that James had to run Quidditch tryouts that I sat with him until curfew. I had to feed him potions and broths myself, and held his hand all afternoon he was in so much pain.

'I hope you apologize, especially since he was good enough to not punch you back. Honestly! What sort of prefect attacks his friend when he isn't looking and beats him bloody for no reason? You deserve every minute of the detentions you've been given, and I hope it interferes with your precious concert.

'I'll be waiting for an owl to let me know you've done the right thing and apologized.

'H.  
'15 October 1976'

Hermione's eyes grew round in amazement. Lupin beat up a murder? With his fists? He broke the boy's jaw and nose? This H must have been gorgeous if she inspired Lupin to go to such lengths to get rid of the competition. As soon as the library opened, she would go see if there was an old yearbook from 1976. Maybe H's photograph would be there, and Lupin's.

Her grin fell as she realized that there was still a werewolf between her and the library. Come morning, there would be a very naked professor between them instead. Maybe she could escape while he was transforming. Surely, the pain would keep him from noticing her exit. Or maybe she could Stupefy him. She was a witch. She had a wand. Did he have his? She glanced around the room and jumped for joy when she saw his wand lying on the bed beside his rumpled suit. He would be exhausted and weaponless, and she would have a way to escape.

So now all she had to do was wait the nine hours until sunrise. At least she had Lupin's book to keep her well entertained. Hermione considered jumping ahead a few pages just to get a move on with the relationship between young Lupin and H, but decided against it. H was so responsive to whatever Remus wrote to her that Hermione was able to guess what his words had been. If she jumped ahead, she would surely get lost.

Besides, she wanted to know if Remus apologized or not.

* * *

A/N: I really do have an unnatural attachment to hand-written correspondence. I write with a fountain pen for cryin' out loud!

Also, I know there's no canon indication that Hogwarts keeps yearbooks, but I once had a high school teacher come in with his yearbook from University of Oxford. So I figure if a Muggle university of that age could have them, so could Hogwarts. :)

THANK YOU so much for the response to this little story. I'm glad you like it, even if some of you did see it coming.


	7. Chapter 7: Dawning

Lupin's Secret  
Chapter 7: Dawning

Six o'clock found Hermione curled up like Crookshanks and snoring quietly at the foot of Lupin's bed. She had fallen asleep at three, but not before reading through the fall of 1977 and seeing the clear transition from flirtation to proper endearments in the letters from H. By March 1977, H and Lupin were obviously dating. It warmed Hermione's heart to read H's words of love and encouragement. She still chided him frequently and teased him mercilessly, especially about his friends, but it was obvious to even an outsider like Hermione that H loved Remus.

As she curled up to sleep, she couldn't imagine what was so awful that Lupin would rather she sit in the room with a werewolf than seek safety in the same room with the book. She assumed it was because the contents were so personal, but, even after six months of dating, the letters contained nothing so intimate that she was embarrassed to have read it. There was no sex talk or references to anything other than his eyes, lips or hands. H wrote in detail about his hands – his long, slender fingers, protruding veins in the back of his hands that she loved to trace and the calloused pads on his fingertips – and his eyes – pale blue with flecks of amber, endlessly deep and mesmerizing. Hermione hadn't considered the physical appearance of her teacher in any way outside wondering about the scars on his face, but after a bit of thought she agreed that the descriptions were accurate. H might have been in love, but she wasn't exaggerating.

As she slept, Hermione imagined her teacher as a young man. Her dreams were filled with Remus, bouncing in time to the snarling punk music with a faceless H laughing at him from the bar. The snarl of the singer grew louder, more frenzied and animalistic and Hermione jumped awake.

"Oh! Lupin," she groaned her annoyance at the door and tried to fall back asleep.

Lupin was snarling against the door handle, his paws and teeth trying to do the work of human hands to turn it and open the door; he might have succeeded if it hadn't been locked and warded. Instead, he was only succeeding in making himself angrier.

Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, Hermione sat up and yawned. Brief as the nap had been, it was the most sleep she had gotten at one time in three days, which wasn't saying much at all. She shuffled back to the desk and sat lightly in the chair, hoping the springs wouldn't give her away. An Auguamenti charm cleaned one of the many cups on the desk and she drank the cool water and nibbled on the abandoned sandwich half as she continued the book.

'Remus J. Lupin,' the letter read.

"Oh, dear," Hermione muttered and looked at the hurried writing. "H is a little angry with you, Professor."

'Remus J. Lupin,

'What is the matter with you? What gives you the right to attack my friends? Poor Richard is in hospital, proper hospital, thanks to you.

'If you had bothered listening to me at all, you'd know that I was not, in fact, cheating on you, you great idiot! Richard and I were working on plotting the path of a comet that I discovered. He has a telescope powerful enough to see it, and he was letting me use it in exchange for partial credit when we announced the find.

'But now, he's in St Mungo's with twenty broken bones after the beating you gave him! Don't you even try to deny it! I know it was you even if Richard is too scared to say anything.

'Who the bloody hell do you think you are?

'I don't even want to know. Don't bother replying or trying to speak to me again. I'm sick of it and of you.

'Good-bye,  
'H.  
'27 September 1977'

"Whoa," Hermione whispered. A shiver ran the length of her frame as she thought of Lupin being so jealous that he actually sent a boy to St Mungo's. She hoped he had mellowed with age or that he had a rule against hurting females. If he didn't, then she was in deep trouble. She had crossed him last night and he would likely never forgive her for breaching his personal space. Maybe, if she was lucky, he wouldn't remember.

She pushed the concern from her mind the only way she knew how, by reading.

'Remus,'

"Well, that's a slight improvement," Hermione commented.

'The nurses told me that you had gone to visit Richard last night. I was worried it was to frighten him even more than you already had, but Richard insisted that you apologized for your stupidity.

'Thank you, but I still don't forgive you even if Richard does.

'Please stop sending notes. I haven't been reading them. And don't bother sending more chocolates. My roommates are complaining they're going to get fat from all the boxes I've pushed on them. I have no intention of eating anything you send.

'Good-bye,  
'H.  
'29 September 1977'

She scanned the next three letters and found them equally as dismissive of the boy's attempts to apologize and Hermione felt very sorry for him. He was clearly at fault, but he was trying so very hard to win her back. If someone had beaten a boy senseless for her, Hermione didn't think she would have the heart to throw him away so callously. It was rather flattering. Admittedly, she would probably be terrified of him for a long while after.

Her eyes fell on the next letter and she smiled at the address.

'Dear Remus,

'I've just been talking to Sirius and James about you. Sirius had been trying to catch me after class all week, but I managed to avoid him when he was working alone. But it's hard to get rid of them when they're working as a team. It's no wonder we always win at Quidditch with James as Captain.

'I'm rambling.

'To the point, then. Sirius and James are very defensive of your behavior. I tried to ignore them as I have been you, but they were quite insistent. Your friends hinted rather cryptically that there might have been another reason for your appalling behavior back in September. Something deeper than misunderstanding and much harder to ignore than jealousy. Sirius mentioned the moon and James a "furry little problem".

'I checked the almanac and saw that the night you attacked Richard was just before the full moon. In fact, every unexplained illness or family emergency you've ever had coincided with the full moon. If my memory is accurate – and I dare you to tell me it isn't – every fight we've ever had has been when the moon is between waxing gibbous and full.

'Remus Lupin, are you a werewolf?

'Eternally curious,  
'H.  
'21 October 1977

'PS. I've charmed this note to be unreadable to anyone who isn't you or me, so don't worry about your secret being discovered.'

Hermione frowned and re-read the post script. If H had charmed the letter so that only she and Remus could read it, then how was Hermione able to see the words? Perhaps the charm had worn off after a decade had passed. Or maybe Lupin had removed it.

"Why would he do that?" she asked herself. "Why would he keep a book that spells out his lycanthropy to anyone who picked it up?"

No, it was much more likely that the charm had vanished with age and that Lupin just didn't realize it. She was probably the first outsider to ever read these letters, so he had no way to know that they were visible to someone other than him.

The frown marred her young face again as her brow folded in on itself in confusion. "But if he thought no one else could read them..." she asked slowly, "then why is he making such a fuss over my being in here?"

Tired, frightened and over-worked as she was, the girl was still the smartest third year in many generations. Her mind whirred to life as she considered the possible meanings of Lupin's panicked anger. This letter, and probably many that followed, was charmed so that none but Remus and the sender, H for Hermione, could read it. Yet Hermione Granger could read it. There were almost no other Hermione's in the world, Muggle or witch, yet Lupin had managed to fall in love with one some thirteen years ago. He had begged and threatened, in his lupine way, to get her from the room where this book was hidden, desperate to keep her from reading it.

His smile, she thought. Sad and amused. It was a smile he wore only for Hermione Granger. She closed her eyes and remembered his face the first time she stayed after class. He had looked extremely nervous. At the time she had thought nothing of it, but now she wondered why he would be nervous around a thirteen-year old witch. He was the superior and had more knowledge and authority. Why would she make him uneasy?

She flipped back to the first letters and read them again quickly. H apologized and insisted she couldn't get involved, citing a promise made and not knowing how long she would be visiting Hogwarts.

"What sort of student doesn't know how long she's going to be a student?" she muttered and sat back in the chair, staring at the page covered in handwriting so like her own. Her fingers toyed with the edge of the book and she pulled them back before she creased or damaged the precious pages. Their nervous motions started to fidget with her gold necklace instead.

She froze.

'Impossible…' she thought.

But even as she denied it, she knew she was correct.

It was time travel. She was H. Her future would take her to Lupin's past and _she_ would be the woman he loved. The lingering child in her wrinkled up her nose in disgust and whined, 'Ew!' But Hermione was mature enough to realize that it wasn't Professor Lupin she would be involved with; it was Remus. Young Remus Lupin who loved the Sex Pistols and had a wicked jealous streak that made him attack his own friends. Young Remus Lupin who was terrified of losing the girl he loved because of his lycanthropy and hid it even after six months together.

She tore through the rest of the book quickly, devouring the letters one after another, absorbing the endearments and chiding remarks and vague references to promises being broken and secrets being hidden. There were some tense letters where she was clearly trying to break it off with Remus because they were getting far too involved, but they were followed almost immediately by letters so loving that Hermione cried.

Dawn was coming on fast. She read through the last few pages as quickly as she could without missing anything. Even with magic and a Time-Turner, she knew that once she ran from his quarters at sunrise, she would never manage to make it back in again. Lupin would lock and ward his doors more securely than the exterior gate of the school. He would hide his precious letters away where she would never find them. If she didn't finish the book before dawn, she would never know her final words to Remus. So, despite the brightening sky and Lupin still clawing at the door, she read.

'Remus My Love,

'I know you'll never forgive me, but I have to say this in a letter. If I tried to tell you in person, I wouldn't be able to look past your beautiful eyes and I would give up everything to find a way to stay with you. I'm sure you'd be thrilled, but there are people waiting for me and a world to save.

'You think I'm exaggerating, but when have you ever known me to do that?

'I'm leaving today. As soon as I send this letter off, I'll be going back where I belong. More accurately, I'm going back _when_ I belong. Do you remember how often I insisted I didn't belong and that I wasn't from around here? Well, that's why. I'm from a different time.

'I tried so hard not to get involved with anyone, afraid that I would change the past and alter the course of history. As painful as it is, events have to play out as they did (or will). You'll find out what I mean all too soon, and you will hate me for it, for not warning you or trying to stop it. People will die, good people, people we love. And so it must be.

'I'm happy to have met them. One day, I'll be able to tell my friends about their parents and what horrid teenagers they were, but what wonderful adults they grew into. Well, maybe not Sirius, he's still horrible for having met you. You might want to have a word with him about thinking before he speaks and acts. Believe me, it will do him good to learn that lesson quickly. He'll get himself into a lot of trouble if he doesn't learn.

'Ah! See, I'm trying to alter future events again. I love you all and I want to keep you all whole and happy, and I would succeed if I stayed. You know better than most that I always do what I set my mind to.

'I know what you've been hiding in your sock drawer for the past few months, afraid to give it to me for fear I'd say no and run away. I'm sorry to say, in a way, you're right. I am saying no and I am running away, but not because I want to and not because I don't love you. I have to in order to keep things as they should be. I don't belong here or with you, despite how much I want to stay and how wonderful I know our life would be.

'I've already written too much. You're a clever man, Remus, and I'm sure you could sort out my meaning if I said any more.

'Know that I love you and always will.

'Give Harry a kiss from me… you'll know who I mean very soon.

'Hermione.  
'19 September 1979

'PS. You will see me again, I promise. Do try to behave yourself.'

Hermione slammed the book shut and jumped away from it. It was overwhelming. Yes, she had worked it out in her head and knew that she was the writer of the letters, but to have written proof of it was too much. There was no question now, no lingering doubts. She was H. Lupin had loved her. If his sad smile was any indication, he still did.

She swallowed hard and fell to the floor as her knees gave out.

"What am I supposed to do now?" she asked. Could she really sit in class and pretend she hadn't read the letters? Would he know? She hurried to stand up and slid the book back under the scrolls of parchment where it had been hiding. She put everything back exactly as it had been; two years of sneaking around with Harry and Ron had given her an eye to detail, and she knew precisely where every book, scroll, cup and plate had been. When she was done, it looked as if she had never been there, excepting the one clean cup and the few bites she had stolen from the sandwich half, but she couldn't change that.

She dropped onto the floor and sat opposite the door, listening to Lupin's frenzied attempts to break in and waiting for the sun to rise. It would be less than fifteen minutes now.

* * *

A/N: So either letter-writing Hermione a) didn't know Remus was a werewolf or b) was playing ignorant... your choice. If it's a), then call it Doctor Who-style wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey stuff. If it's b), then she was just trying to keep to her role until the very end and was only asking for Remus's benefit.

The POLL is now closed. Time Turned Back is our winner. Chapter one will likely be posted tomorrow. If you were rooting for An Ounce of Prevention, no worries, it will be posted, too... just not as quickly.

THANKS to everyone who voted and, of course, to everyone who is still reading my stuff. Hope you're enjoying it.


	8. Chapter 8: Run Away

Lupin's Secret  
Chapter 8: Run Away

Despite her fatigue, Hermione stayed awake and stared intently at the door for the few minutes before sunrise. The gap at the bottom of the door looked worryingly large, and she was sure that Lupin had managed to scratch a large dent in his side of it. If he had a little more time, he probably could have scratched clear through it. But as she saw his paws coming through the enlarged gap at the bottom of the door, she knew there were mere moments left and he wouldn't have enough time to reach her.

Standing, she gripped her wand and readied herself for her escape.

With one final glance at the desk to ensure it looked as it had when she sought refuge in his room, she set her hand on the handle and removed the wards on the door. She pressed her ear to the wood and listened to the wolf's whining, flinching and jumping away when the howls began. They were frighteningly loud and made her heart ache when she realized they were cries of pain. The sun was rising. The transformation back into his human form had started.

She had been correct. Even with Wolfsbane Potion, the transformation still hurt him. The wolf cried out, long and loud.

If Hermione thought his howls were heartbreaking, they were nothing to when his human voice took over. Lupin screamed as she had never heard anyone scream before. It sounded like he was being ripped apart. Her hands flew to her ears to block out the sound, but it wasn't enough. She could still hear him.

Then he was silent.

'Perhaps he passed out,' she thought hopefully.

"Hermione," Lupin said quietly, his voice hoarse from screaming. He knocked tentatively on the door. "Please open the door."

He knocked again, louder.

"Why?" she asked in a tiny and shaking voice.

"Because I need to talk to you," he said. "Open the door."

"No," she said, cringing to hear how petulant she sounded.

He practically growled. "This is ridiculous. That is my room, Hermione. Open the door."

"No!"

She flinched when he slapped his hand on the door. "I'm in no mood for this. Open the god damned door!"

Remembering his temper around the full moon, Hermione thought better than to chide him about speaking to a student in such a way. He had beaten up one of his own friends and put another boy in St Mungo's for less. Granted, that was over ten years ago and he had been spurred on by jealousy.

"Hermione!" he shouted and slammed his hand against the door again.

"I don't want to see you naked!" she admitted.

He laughed. "I'm wearing your cloak, Hermione. Open the door," replied the man more kindly.

"Okay…" she said quietly. She felt bad for what she was about to do, but she did not want to have to talk to him about what she had read or seen. Not right now. Not ever, if she was completely honest. Gripping her wand and readying a spell to knock her teacher unconscious, she unlocked the door and opened it a crack.

Lupin poked his head through. He looked tired and his hair was sticking up in every direction. She imagined that was probably what he looked like when he first woke up in the morning. Had H ever seen him looking like that? She shook her head before she could continue with that particularly intimate line of thinking. She really did not want to think about herself in bed with Remus.

"Uh… Hermione…" Lupin said quietly, all anger gone from his voice at the sight of her looking as tired and terrified as she was.

"Stupefy!" she screamed and threw the spell at him. His body fell hard into the door, throwing it open and knocking her backward. He was thin, but still weighed more than she did.

The girl paused to study him. Lupin was wearing Harry's cloak around his waist, making his legs and feet invisible. His torso and arms were unnaturally thin and scarred more than she would have expected. According to the books she had read on the topic, werewolves were known to tear themselves to ribbons when there were no victims for them to attack.

"Poor man," she said and fought to keep her hand from smoothing his unruly hair down. "Don't, Hermione. You can't leave any evidence."

She hopped over his unconscious body and turned her face away as she stole back the invisibility cloak. She wasn't lying when she told him that she didn't want to see him naked. Holding her hand up to block his body from view, she quickly looked around his room and made sure that it was exactly as it had been before she arrived, clean cup and partially eaten sandwich notwithstanding. Satisfied that she had left no trace, she hurried into his office. She righted the chairs in front of his desk, unlocked the door, removed the wards and escaped into the corridor, relocking and warding it before running as fast as she could back to Gryffindor tower.

As she ran, hidden beneath the cloak, she wished that it was Saturday. She wanted to fall into bed and sleep the rest of the morning away. If she was asleep, she wouldn't be able to actively think about what she had discovered that night. More than anything, she wanted to avoid thinking about dating Remus Lupin.

At the very least, she didn't have to deal with Lupin again until Thursday. If the previous month's full moon was any indication, he might still be recovering by Thursday. She would happily take Snape's snide comments over the potential for a meaningful chat with Lupin.

If she was very, very lucky, Lupin would think he had hallucinated her presence and treat her no differently than he already did, which she was only just realizing was rather different than he treated anyone else. He didn't question her answers as he did everyone else's. What made him so sure she wasn't guessing? He didn't hesitate to allow her to stay after class and ask questions. Unlike the other teachers, he willingly gave her more reading and extra credit even though he was clearly giving her an advantage over her classmates; all the other teachers declined her request multiple times before they finally gave in, but not Lupin. And then there was that smile, simultaneously filled with mirth and mourning. She imagined he must find her fourteen-year old self very amusing after knowing her from the ages of seventeen to twenty.

How long had she been gone from Lupin's life, she wondered. A quick bit of maths found that Lupin was around thirty-three now, and H had been gone for fourteen years. Odd that H had gone back to her proper time the exact date Hermione was born.

She lay on her bed, staring up at the scarlet canopy, considering what that might mean. Despite the invention of Time-Turners, very little was known about time travel. She had read all the available books when McGonagall offered it to her, just to make sure she made the right decision and truly understood the ramifications of wearing it. No scientific studies had been made into time travel, but she was certain that the date of the last letter was no coincidence. For one, she didn't believe in coincidences, and, for another, why would she have chosen that particular day to return?

Maybe now that she knew what she was looking for, one of the library books would be more useful to her. She would go there as soon as she was done with Care of Magical Creatures. Actually, being the only girl in school in possession of a Time-Turner, she would probably be there _during_ Care of Magical Creatures.

As she marched happily down the grass to see what dangerous animal Hagrid was crooning over that morning, Hermione climbed the ladder and pulled out one of the books on time travel. She charmed it down to the table with the other books she had gathered on the topic. There were a surprising number of books in the Hogwarts library about time travel, though most were fictional, exaggerated or theoretical. Still, any knowledge was better than questions.

She grumbled as she tore through the books, the stack of potentials dwindling quickly while the pile of useless tomes grew taller. Never before had she felt the Hogwarts library was wasting her time, and she found it very hard to believe that it was doing so now. There had to be something.

'Ah! Eureka!' she squealed internally as she read through a translation of an Arabic time traveler's journal.

'I had intended to remain in this life I had built, with my new wife and strong sons, but as the day of my original birth arrived, I could not live dually in this world. Only one of my beings could remain and I, my forty-year-old self, was ejected back to my appropriate time.'

Hermione had proven this was not true. She was currently existing in two places in the same time. Just the previous week she had a dozen versions of herself running around Hogwarts. What was different?

Flipping back to the beginning of the book, she read again how the man had sent himself into the past. He had traveled with a combination of potion and spells, while Hermione was using a Time-Turner. It had to be the device that was keeping her whole and stable while the other Hermiones existed. That was the difference between Hermione and H.

Hermione assumed that in three years or so she would be sent to the past. If she had chosen to go, she would have a way back or someone would have come to collect her. Since no one came for her, that meant no one knew where, or rather _when_, she had gone. Without a Time-Turner to take her forward to her proper time, H was forced to live the life of a 1970s Hogwarts student, trying to stay out of history's way… and failing only slightly.

"But when I was born – the proper me that belonged in that timeline – secondary time traveling Hermione had to go back where she belonged," she reasoned uncertainly, frowning at her own lack of total understanding.

The girl gripped her hair and tried not to scream. This was hurting her brain.

She longed for the easy problems of basilisks and mass murderers. Time travel was too confusing. She didn't want to think about this anymore. Tossing the last book aside, she stood and marched from the library.

Hurrying back to the Gryffindor tower, Hermione threw herself into the comparatively easy task of homework. She read and wrote and ignored the proverbial hippogriff in the room, pretending there was no issue with Lupin or time travel or Defence class. She made it through to Thursday with practiced ease, and walked to DADA with a small smirk on her face.

"What're you so happy about?" Ron asked. "And why are you walking with us? Normally you run on ahead to pester Lupin for more homework."

"Don't be such an infant, Ronald," she fought to keep her eyes from rolling.

"He's right, though," Harry pointed out.

She smacked his arm lightly. Her mood slightly diminished by their observations and by the proximity to the Defence classroom. "Harry, can you poke your head in and see who's teaching today?"

"What?"

"Please."

Harry shrugged. He'd noticed Lupin wasn't looking too well at meals lately and had even missed a few, but he didn't see why Hermione cared if he was teaching the class or not. Poking his head into the open doorway, he spied Lupin at his desk. The man didn't look well enough to be teaching, but he glanced up and smiled.

"It's okay," Harry said. "It's Lupin."

"Oh, dear," Hermione bit her lip and hesitated outside the doorway. Ron and Harry went in and sat down, but she stayed out in the corridor. She didn't want to give him any reason to suspect her, but she really wasn't up to looking him in the eye. It had only been three days since she learned that her future self and his past self had been intimate.

"Problem, Miss Granger?" Lupin's quiet voice asked from the doorway.

She managed not to squeak in surprise, but only just. "Not at all, Professor," she muttered and hurried around him. Avoiding his questioning gaze, she slouched down into her seat and busied herself arranging her book and notebook and quill and ink. She took so long making sure everything was just so on her table, that even Ron was looking at her strangely by the time the lesson started.

Lupin spent most of the lesson leaning on his desk, unable to stand for more than a few minutes at a time. He might not have been completely recovered from Monday's full moon, but he still taught with gusto. Hermione found herself smiling by the end and clapping along with everyone else when he announced the end of lesson. The man was a brilliant teacher and she regretted making things odd between them. She would have dearly loved to stay and ask him a few questions, but knew he would turn the conversation to her illegal visit to his office.

"Miss Granger, might I have a word?" he called over the voices.

This time she did squeak. "Oh… um… No, sorry, Professor, I promised Professor Hagrid I'd help him with his flobberworms," she lied quickly and ran from the room.

"I do believe she's avoiding me," Lupin commented to the girl's confused friends, who nodded their agreement. Hermione had never once lied to a teacher or ignored a teacher's request without it being a life or death situation… usually one involving Harry. The boys were understandably concerned.

* * *

A/N: Nearly finished with this one. That makes me sad. I like this story very much. BUT Time Turned Back has started. Chapter 1 is up.

Surprisingly, there is substitute work in the first week of school and I now have assignments to bring me in some cashy money. So, I'll try to keep the chapters coming in the morning before I had to work, but they might be a bit delayed... we'll see how good I am about getting up with my alarms.


	9. Chapter 9: Cheeky

A/N: I've been asked by more than one person where this figures into my other stories. The answer is that it doesn't. All my stories exist independently of the others, often times the characters are slightly altered. If you want it to be part of Time Turned Back, you are free to think of it that way... but there are differences and you will be confused if you continue to pair them. Just an FYI.

* * *

Lupin's Secret  
Chapter 9: Cheeky

Through a careful combination of lies, secret passages, dungbombs and time travel, Hermione managed to successfully avoid being alone with Lupin through the end of the year. Her appreciation of this fact might have been stronger if she was snuggling into the seat of a train compartment steaming away from the castle, but she needed to stay behind to aid Hagrid in his defense of Buckbeak. So the girl relaxed into one of the chairs by the fire, knowing that no one would force her out of it. Thanks to Sirius Black's attempts to kill Harry, very few students had stayed at Hogwarts for the Christmas holiday. Frightening as the idea of an escaped mass murderer was, she was happy to have the place more or less to herself… even if it did mean having to avoid Lupin.

She opened the borrowed library book and started reading the legal text, hoping to find some precedence for an insulted Hippogriff being set free. The only cases similar had resulted in executions, which were in no way helpful or heartening. She frowned and forced herself out of the chair and toward the library again.

The library was as quiet as it ever was. Madam Pince pursed her lips as Hermione returned the book and narrowed her eyes at the girl as she went back into the stacks. The woman reminded Hermione of a vulture, useful but frightening.

The girl was grateful to be out of the librarian's sights and relaxed again as she turned her attention to the books. There had to be something to help Buckbeak. Surely even the prejudiced Wizengamot would accept that the beast was acting on instinct, that he had been insulted and reacted accordingly. It would be no worse than a man slapping someone who insulted him. Well, maybe more akin to a man stabbing someone who insulted him, which did seemed a bit excessive.

"Positive thoughts, Hermione," she told herself. "You _will _find a good defense."

She started pulling down books and carrying them to the nearest table. The library wasn't nearly as comfortable or warm as the chair by the fire, but she didn't fancy having to walk back every time she found her chosen book to be useless. She settled down at the table and started reading, quickly tossing aside the first, second and third books. Every ruling showed the Wizengamot to be a very unfair judicial body. Two hours and four more books later, Hermione was growing despondent.

'I need some cheering up,' she thought and remembered the yearbooks.

Jumping to her feet, she ran back into the stacks and found the yearbooks on a dusty lower shelf. She was thankful they only went back to 1910, though she would have liked to look back and found Dumbledore's Hogwarts years. She found the 1973-'74 book and started to flip through it. The castle was unchanged and much of the teaching staff was the same, so it was rather like looking at pictures of the current students.

It was slightly disappointing until she spied a boy who looked like Harry. The boy grinned toothily out at her and pulled his friends into frame, a tall and handsome boy with hair that was much too long and a sandy-haired boy with a scar across his face. He looked bashfully toward the camera but she could see it was an act by the glint in his eye.

"Lupin," Hermione smiled and stared at him. He was… cute. Mischievously so, but still much cuter than any boy she knew personally. She kept turning the pages, looking for more pictures of him. She found him every few pages. He and his friends were apparently very popular, even in their third year. She wondered what the '93-'94 yearbook would look like, would Hermione appear in even one photo?

Did H appear in any, she wondered, shoving the yearbook back onto the shelf and ripping out the one from three years later. Her fingers eagerly sought out every page with sixth years on them, Hufflepuffs, Ravenclaws, Slytherins. She paused on the page filled with scowls and disdainful glances. There had to be a reason Snape knew Lupin's secret and the only possible one she had managed to come up with was that he attended Hogwarts with Lupin. She scanned the pages and found a boy half hidden behind lank black hair, and she knew him immediately. Severus Snape.

'I knew it,' she thought triumphantly and turned the page rather harder than was necessary to the Gryffindors. She found the name she sought immediately.

'Hermione J. Granger,' she read and saw the small picture of a girl who was unmistakably her. The hair was tamed, the teeth where smaller, but it was her. "That's me."

"Read any good books lately?" a smirking voice asked quietly.

"No," she replied numbly, more to her own disbelief than to the question asked.

"Really?" he said. "Judging by what you're reading now, I'd say you had read something very interesting recently."

Hermione looked up and saw Lupin leaning on the bookcase behind her, the 1977-'78 yearbooks open in his hands. He glanced from his book to hers and smiled. "I was a cheeky one, wasn't I?"

She followed his gaze and saw Remus J. Lupin grinning and making suggestive eyebrow wiggles from his photograph. Refusing to comment or be alone with Lupin, she slammed the book shut, shoved it into the wrong place on the shelf and ran from the library.

"Hermione!" he called and chased after her. "Miss Granger! If you don't stop avoiding me, I will give you detention for a month!"

"You wouldn't!" she squeaked, spinning to stare at him.

"I would," he assured her.

"I haven't done anything!"

He quirked an eyebrow at her, "Are you sure about that?"

The girl stood to her full height and glared at him, though the affect was considerably diminished by the flush on her cheeks. "Yes, I am."

"So…" he said slowly, stepping closer to keep his voice low. "You haven't been sneaking around the halls after curfew, breaking into some poor teacher's office and private quarters, reading his private books and stunning him stupid?" He held her eye and watched as she fought not to flinch. "Oh, and stealing the man's favorite sandwich."

"Part of a sandwich!" she corrected obstinately, but realized what she'd done, "Oh! Damn!"

He smiled. "You're right, of course. Part of a sandwich."

"Sorry, I was hungry."

"Quite all right," he assured her. "But why were you even there?"

"Snape," she said quietly.

Lupin froze and looked around the corridor, "Is he here?"

"No, in October, when you were 'indisposed', he had us write that essay on werewolves and I noticed a few of the characteristics fit you rather well, and got curious," she said, quieter still. "But I couldn't be sure without seeing for myself, so I thought I'd go in under an invisibility cloak. I forgot dogs have such a good sense of smell," she admitted grudgingly.

He nodded, waiting for more. "And?"

"And what?"

"And what about what you did in my quarters?" he prompted.

"…I ate your sandwich… I said I was sorry."

He observed her a moment. "You're surprisingly good at lying when you want to be, did you know that?" He smiled, "I know you read it, Hermione. My sense of smell is heightened even when I'm not 'indisposed'. I could smell you on it."

"Really? That's fascinating! I've never read that in any of the books on werewolves before. You really ought to write one yourself, Professor. Some of the things people have written is utter nonsense, and I'm sure –"

"Hermione," he snapped. "Stop trying to distract me."

"What? No, I was… just… suggesting…" She bit her lip as his glare hardened further. 'He sent a boy to St Mungo's with twenty broken bones, remember? Don't make him mad,' she told herself rather sensibly. "I didn't plan on it. I just wanted to see if you were … what you were… but then you started threatening and I ran, and I couldn't understand why you didn't want me in there. So technically, it's your fault."

He leaned against the wall, folding his arms across his chest and considering her like a strange insect, "And how do you figure that, precisely?"

"Well, you made such a fuss! How could I not be curious when you were there whining and growling at me to get out? I had to know what you were on about!" she reasoned.

"And you found it."

She dropped her eyes and studied her shoes with more interest than they deserved. "Yes."

"What do you think?" his voice had dropped so low it was practically a whisper, but she heard him. She heard the intensity in the question and didn't dare keep silent.

"I think I shouldn't have gone poking my nose where it didn't belong," she grumbled, making him laugh.

"Very astute observation, Miss Granger," Lupin said with a smile. "Any other thoughts."

She shook her head.

"Good," he said and stood in silent consideration of the girl. "Any questions?"

She hesitated. "D… Did you really send someone to hospital with twenty broken bones?"

He nodded.

"Did you really break Sirius's nose and jaw?"

Again he nodded. "And before you ask: Yes, that is the same Sirius who had been trying to kill Harry since summer."

"Oh," she said, blanching at the thought. "You were friends."

"We were, but things change," he said darkly. She remembered he took that tone the day he caught her pacing outside his office. It had been Sirius Black who had disappointed him. She wanted to ask how, what the handsome boy had done, but she didn't think he would tell her.

Another question came to mind. "What did you keep in your sock drawer?"

"What?"

"The last letter, she wrote that she knew what you were hiding in your sock drawer… what was it?"

"_She_," he paused and smiled at her referring to the writer as a separate person, "was as nosy as you are… Like you, she enjoyed poking around in everything, wanted to know everyone's business. But that is one thing I will keep to myself."

"Oh. All right. What happens now?" she asked, daring to look at his face. "Are you going to give me detention?"

He smiled and shook his head, "No."

"Report me to Dumbledore? Wipe my memory?"

"No and no, Hermione," he said. "We are going to pretend none of this ever happened. I am going to keep teaching, you are going to keep asking excessive questions. That was working very well before you got overly curious. Can you handle that?"

"Yes," she said. "Are you sure you don't want to tell me what you kept in your sock drawer?"

He laughed, a deep laugh that she felt vibrating in her chest. "No, Miss Granger. I think you'll find that that is none of your damn business. Now, what were you researching before you got so interested in how handsome I was in my youth?"

She blushed and hoped that she hadn't made her comments about how cute he was aloud. "Legal defense for Hippogriffs. Hagrid's is going to be executed if we can't find a good defense for him."

"Would you like some help?" he offered.

"No, thank you," she said politely. "Harry and Ron should be helping me, and I don't think it would go along with our teaching-excessive questions arrangement if you were to sit and help."

He nodded, "Correct as always, Miss Granger. Well, Good luck."

"Thank you, Professor," she said and walked back to the library. Despite his reassurances, she couldn't believe things would ever be the same between them. How could it when she knew nearly all his secrets? How was she ever going to go back to normal knowing that he knew?

And what did he keep in his sock drawer? That was going to drive her batty!

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A/N: Once again I say that if Oxford can have yearbooks, so, too, can Hogwarts!

THANK YOU to everyone reading, enjoying and reviewing. I'm loving the feedback.


	10. Chapter 10: Unspoken

A/N: SUPER HUGE THANK YOU to _Lalinn_, my shiny new, brilliant, stickler of a Beta. Yes! I have a Beta! I'm moving up in the world.

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Lupin's Secret  
Chapter 10: Unspoken

Hermione dropped into her seat in the library and began flipping through her books again. They were no more help the second time around, although her current level of distraction might have had a good deal to do with their uselessness. She could not focus. Her mind was wandering to the sock drawer, to Sirius Black, to cheeky young Remus Lupin.

There was no possible way she could go on living her life normally with so much oddity filling her brain.

Yet she did.

Starting with the first Thursday after Christmas holiday, she sat alone with Lupin before class asking too many questions and never once wondering if he was comparing her to H. She was H, only just not yet. He kept to his promise, teaching her as if she were the same as any other student… with the exception of a few extra credit assignments. It was a wonderful arrangement that she would gladly have continued through the end of her seventh year. If only events hadn't gotten in the way and prevented him from remaining their DADA teacher.

But life got stranger still. Harry chased a killer and gained a Godfather, Remus found the truth and regained an old friend, jobs were lost as were lives, Sirius fell, the Dark Lord rose and an underground war was waged, and through it all Hermione and Lupin never once mentioned H again.

Hermione often thought about her and whatever it was hiding in Lupin's sock drawer, but she never brought it up again. He wouldn't tell her even if she did ask, and she knew better than to go poking around his room again. Lupin had forgiven her curiosity once, but she didn't expect him to be so kind should she try a second time.

And then it happened.

In the summer before sixth year, when she was supposed to be guarded on her way to the Burrow, the Death Eaters came. They must have been hiding in the fields outside the Burrow for weeks waiting to cripple the Golden Trio and send a message to The Chosen One. Hidden behind their masks, they looked almost like scarecrows.

She staggered as Tonks fell to a Stunner; even in unconsciousness the woman was clumsy, her legs sticking out and tripping those who might come to Hermione's aid. Personal safety took precedence over obedience to the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery; Hermione drew her wand and sent defensive spells out at everything that moved. She could see the house, see the figures running out to help her. Lupin was among them, his face stricken and wand ready. Somewhere in her mind, amid the chaos and shouts, she knew this was the moment when she would become H. She wondered why he was sprinting forward to stop it from happening.

It was impossible to know what happened, but she could guess. Conflicting spells converged at a central point – her – and intertwined to create a unique and powerful magic, one that tore time apart and sent her flying through the gash. She vanished from sight.

Ron ran screaming into the fields outside his home, searching for his friend and not finding her. Lupin guided him back, patting his arm comfortingly. "Don't worry, she'll be back," he said assuredly.

"How can you be so bloody calm?" Ron shrieked and started pacing the cramped sitting room of his childhood home while his parents and siblings looked on worriedly.

The man shrugged and sat back, watching the panicked child run around. He sipped his tea and waited patiently, knowing she would be back and perfectly unharmed. The only thing he didn't know was when. His knowledge of time travel was extensive thanks to years of being involved with a woman from a different time. After she had left, he had read every book on the subject and, if the authors were correct, she ought to return fairly close to the moment of departure.

But the authors were wrong or at least failed to recognize that 'fairly close' in the scope of the whole of time could still be quite a long while.

Hermione was missing all summer. Harry arrived shortly before his birthday in July and, after a day of cursing everyone under the roof, especially Remus and Ron, for not telling him sooner, started panicking. The eldest Weasley sons flew in from their jobs, though what purpose they hoped to serve was beyond Remus. He told them where she was, _when_ she was, but they still paced and worried and searched.

He started to wonder if he was the odd man out. Should he be pacing and worrying and searching, too?

'Why?' he thought. 'She's back in my youth. What could I hope to find here and now?'

"Git," Ron grumbled at him again.

September first came and took Ginny, Harry and Ron away. Bill and Charlie returned to their jobs in London and Romania. Remus had nothing to do but wait.

"Maybe we should tell her parents," Arthur suggested over drinks one night in October.

"Give it time," Remus insisted, and Molly patted his shoulder consolingly.

He shuffled up the stairs, bypassing the room they let him borrow in favor of looking in on her room. Really, it was Ginny's room, but Hermione always stayed there with her, and her trunk was still under the bed. To him, and everyone else, this was Hermione's room. He dreaded the children's return from Hogwarts when Ginny would take over the quiet memorial.

Once she was back in her own room, he would no longer be allowed to sit and wait for her in the night. Once she was back, he couldn't pace silently before the door, begging every power that might be to bring her back safely. Once Ginny was back, he knew he would lose all hope.

Ginny came back.

She and Harry and Ron came crashing through the door.

"Tell me Hermione's back," Ron demanded.

Molly hugged him and kissed his cheek, too kindhearted to tell him the truth but unwilling to lie to her boy, "Welcome home."

"Dammit!" Harry kicked his trunk and dropped onto it sullenly. "I thought you said she'd be back like no time had passed."

"That's what should have happened," Remus replied quietly. Everything he said lately was done quietly. He was a man without hope, and men without hope don't have the energy to do anything with enthusiasm. What did he have to be enthusiastic about? He had lived seventeen of his thirty-five years believing that he would be reunited with the woman he lost, and now every minute that passed was another he knew she should have been back with him.

Time travel, though, was funny, funnier than anyone really understood. It seemed to follow no rules. Two identical people could exist in a single timeline for years, while two others could never co-exist. Two Hermiones, it seemed, could not exist together without a Time-Turner holding one in place. As one was born, the other was sent back to her own time… but not quite when she belonged.

"Happy Christmas," Ginny muttered with as much happiness as she could.

"Happy Christmas?"

Ron turned and dropped the gift Ginny had just passed him. "'Mione!" The boy launched himself across the sitting room at the woman who stood in the doorway, shivering from her trek across their snowy garden. He hugged her tight and planted an awkward kiss on her cheek.

"Where have you been?" Molly demanded, her voice shaking the portraits on the walls and rattling the glasses in the cupboards.

"Away," Hermione said vaguely, her eyes never leaving Remus.

"You look different…" Harry said, and he didn't just mean her clothes. The thin dress and unusually tall platform sandals were all very unlike Hermione. She had dressed for summer, assuming, as Remus had, that she would be returning to the moment of her departure. Harry could overlook a change in style, but her face had lost some of its roundness and she looked… "Older."

"Three years will do that to you," she said with a strange smile.

"Hermione," Remus breathed, too stunned to believe she had actually come back.

She held a hand up to stop his approach, and said sternly, "Hold that thought." Moving with the practiced skill of a woman who spent over three years walking in platform shoes, Hermione ran up the stairs, leaving them all standing in a stunned silence. They could hear her on the stairs, ascending and then descending a few short minutes later.

Hermione walked the last few steps and smiled as she came back into view. "Sorry I took so long."

"Hermione," Remus said again, looking at her as she walked to him. "Where have you been?"

"To your sock drawer," she smiled and held up the little cardboard box that she had seen nestled among his rolls of socks seventeen years earlier. Tossing the lid aside, she removed the ring and slid it onto her finger. "Yes, I will."

"I haven't asked yet," he said, smirking.

"You don't have to. I know what you mean to say… but there was something you never said to me in three years of going out, Mr Lupin," she chided him even as she wrapped her arms around his neck.

"Hm. I can't imagine what that might be," he said and drew in a deep breath, filling his nose with her scent. This wasn't the Hermione who had vanished in summer; she smelled of ink and parchment and peppermint. This woman smelled of vanilla and irises and leather-bound books. This was the Hermione who had left him in 1979.

"Oi!" Ron shouted and pushed himself between them. "That is my friend."

"Ronald!" Hermione snapped, but her words were lost as Lupin invaded the boy's personal space. He seemed to tower over the boy even though they were within inches of the same height; the werewolf's feral instincts driving him to dominate the younger man, staring hard into the boy's eyes and forcing him to back down from the terrifying snarl.

"Don't you even think about coming between me and the woman I love, Ronald Weasley," he breathed, low and threatening. "I've waited decades for her to come back to me, and I won't wait a second longer."

"W… h… r… _huh_?" Ron stuttered and stumbled away, falling over his sister, who stood glued to the scene like it was the most romantic thing she'd ever witnessed.

"And that would be the thing you never told me," Hermione commented.

"What?" Remus turned and smiled a wicked grin, his face lighting up as it hadn't in seventeen years and his eyes glinting with familiar mischief as he took her into his arms. "That I love you? You knew that already."

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A/N: That's it. The end. Thank you for reading and reviewing and favoriting and all those wonderful things you do.

Once again, a ginormous THANK YOU to _Lalinn_, who made sure my ending wasn't rushed and my time traveling actually made sense. It may be fantasy, but it's still gotta make sense.


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